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The blog for Global Call Forwarding has articles on the latest customer service trends, telecommunications technologies, and business news.
International call forwarding benefits
29th July 2020 blog, Business Phone Numbers, Call Management

5 Top International Call Forwarding Benefits

international toll free numbers
27th July 2020 blog, Business Phone Numbers

Comparing All Types of International Toll Free Numbers

virtual team communication tips
23rd July 2020 blog, Business Insights

Virtual Team Communication: 10 Proven Tips for 2026

Call Center Performance Management
22nd July 2020 blog, Call Center

What is Call Center Performance Management? [2026]

outbound strategy
21st July 2020 blog, Call Management

11 Tips to Improve Your Outbound Calls Strategy

Customer Success
16th July 2020 blog, Customer Service

What is Customer Success?

first call resolution
15th July 2020 blog, Customer Service

What is First Call Resolution?

UIFN - Universal International Freephone Number
13th July 2020 blog, Business Phone Numbers

What is a Universal International Freephone Number (UIFN)?

Set up a Virtual Phone System
9th July 2020 blog, Cloud Telephony

How to Set up a Virtual Phone System?

5 Top International Call Forwarding Benefits

29th July 2020 blog, Business Phone Numbers, Call Management

International call forwarding is used by tens of thousands of businesses worldwide, as there are many associated benefits. Here we outline the top 5 business call forwarding benefits that an international or remote call forwarding service brings to any business.

5 Benefits of International Call Forwarding for Small Business

International call forwarding helps your company do business internationally, by forwarding or rerouting calls made to a virtual phone number to a destination number, or multiple destinations anywhere in the world.

For example, calls made to your virtual number can be forwarded to your smartphone, remote employees, or office PBX system. This makes it possible to receive free phone calls from any location in the world. It also gives your business credibility. So how can international call forwarding benefit your small business?

Related: How International Call Forwarding Works

1. Make Your Business Reachable

With international call forwarding and toll free numbers, your business can provide international and long-distance customers and contacts a free way to connect with your business. Customers in different countries can call your international toll free number for that country for free and get the support they need. Meanwhile, you can forward incoming calls to any device or line that is convenient for you.

Making your business reachable and accessible is an important part of doing business internationally. Customers trust a company that responds and resolves issues quickly. If they struggle to get a hold of you, then your customers will take their business elsewhere.

2. More Global Coverage

One of the most popular business call forwarding benefits is the ability to improve a business’ global reach. If global expansion is on your company’s list of goals, then you need to find the right tools to help you enter the global market without dramatically increasing the cost of operation. Global Call Forwarding, for instance, offers virtual phone numbers such as local, mobile, and international toll free numbers for more than 160 countries across the globe.

You can use these numbers from your country of origin, without needing to relocate or open field offices. Then, test how your product/service is doing and how customers are responding to it. Based on how well the market test goes, you can choose to open a field office or hire remote customer service agents or employees in the vicinity. This way, you can add customers from various countries to your customer base.

3. Increase Local and International Presence

Virtual numbers help you create a local presence within countries, states, and cities across the world. This is because you can get a local or toll free number assigned to that area and callers can contact your business as a local business while you receive calls instantly in your home country through the international call forwarding service. And so, even if you are not physically present within a region or country, you have a virtual presence. However, customers are not privy to this information. Globalization is at a critical juncture, and call forwarding services enable businesses to stay connected to customers on a global scale.

4. Reduce Use of Voicemail

With international call forwarding, you can have calls forwarded to your smartphone or home office during the evenings or the weekend. This way, when callers contact you outside of business hours, they can still get a hold of your services instead of leaving a voicemail. This can help build customer loyalty during this age of continuous connection, as customers appreciate talking to someone instantly.

5. Offer After-Hours Customer Service

Being able to provide uninterrupted service is another one of the top business call forwarding benefits. Additionally, you can aim to offer 24/7 customer support. Do this by forwarding calls to your home office or remote employees located in different time zones. This not only makes your business more reachable but more likely to improve customer experience and satisfaction.

Get International Call Forwarding Today

Get an international call forwarding service from Global Call Forwarding. Upgrade your business phone system so you can offer sales and customer support to interested prospects around the world. Want to learn more? Call or chat with us today!

Comparing All Types of International Toll Free Numbers

27th July 2020 blog, Business Phone Numbers

Most companies are trying to go global to expand their reach and generate more sales. But how do you communicate with international clientele without increasing your expenses? International toll-free numbers are the way to go! Here we compare all the types of international toll free numbers so you can find one that is perfect for your needs.

Comparing All Types of International Toll-Free Numbers

An international toll free number or ITFN is a number type that enables international calling between a business and its customers. Callers dial this number for free and it connects to employees or agents in a different country by forwarding calls internationally to any device.

Certain types of international toll free numbers, such as traditional international numbers, are country-specific. That is, they are free to call from within the country they are assigned to. On the other hand, universal or global freephone numbers can be contacted for free from a predetermined list of countries.

If your business has an international clientele and you want to provide international customers with the same customer service and care you offer domestic or local customers, then your business could greatly benefit from international toll free numbers. It is known that global consumers want convenience in 2025.

Let’s look at the different types of international toll free numbers so you can identify which is more suitable for your needs.

ITFN

ITFN are country-specific and can be called for free by residents of the country they are assigned to. You can forward incoming calls to smartphones, computers, VoIP softphones, and more. Businesses with international clientele will find these numbers useful. With these numbers, your company can create a virtual presence in different countries and offer customer service globally.

Domestic Toll-Free Numbers

Domestic toll-free numbers are similar to ITFN in that they too can be called by a resident of the country the number is assigned to. In other words, residents of the US can call a US toll-free number for free when in-country. These numbers are true “800 numbers.”

The main difference between domestic and international toll-free numbers is that the former does not generally have additional fees for calls connecting to mobile or pay phones. Therefore, businesses that want to provide callers with a free way to call from any device will find domestic toll-free numbers more suitable.

Local 2-Way Numbers

Local 2-Way Voice enables users to place outbound calls with a local phone number and display an in-country caller ID. These are essentially cloud-based local numbers that support both inbound and outbound voice calling, no matter where the business is located.

Calls made with Local 2-Way Voice are routed through local routes instead of international routes, even if your business is not located in that specific region. This means these calls are guaranteed to connect and show a local caller ID. Additionally, since these are local phone numbers, they have country and region-specific phone number formats. These are recognizable and familiar, helping your business increase response rates and encourage callbacks.

UIFN

A UIFN is a single unique number that is accessible and free to call from multiple countries. Currently, 60 countries are included in the UIFN number program monitored by the International Telecommunication Union (ITU). There are, however, some factors to consider when purchasing UIFNs:

  • Your number must be registered in at least 2 countries.
  • You must use the number between 2 countries within the first 180 days of purchase.
  • These numbers have a significant, one-time setup fee.
  • The different dialing formats are different from regular or standard toll-free numbers.
  • Not all countries are included in the program.
  • The more countries selected, the higher the cost.

If you run operations and want to offer customer service in the countries included in the UIFN program, then you may consider a UIFN number to streamline incoming calls and provide just one number for customer support, sales, account management, etc.

Toll-Free 2-Way Voice

Toll-Free 2-Way Voice enables businesses to use the same international toll-free number for both inbound and outbound calls, creating a consistent and recognizable point of contact for customers. Instead of showing a local or unknown caller ID, outbound calls display the company’s toll-free number, helping improve answer rates and brand trust across regions. This makes Toll-Free 2-Way Voice especially valuable for global sales and support teams that want a unified presence while maintaining the accessibility customers expect from toll-free calling.

What Type of International Toll-Free Number is Right for Me?

If your business extends operations to 2-3 different countries, then you can get international toll-free numbers or domestic numbers for each country and list them on your website or social media platforms. This way, you can provide customer service and sales assistance to clients within these countries.

However, for a business like a travel or hospitality company with multiple locations involved, a UIFN is more useful. This way, customers from around the world can connect with you through one number.

 Want to Learn More?

Global Call Forwarding is the leading provider of international toll-free numbers. We have been in this business for over 25 years and we offer unmatched quality, affordability, and service features. We can help you find the ideal phone number for your company. Call us today to learn more!

Virtual Team Communication: 10 Proven Tips for 2026

23rd July 2020 blog, Business Insights

Is your business considering moving to virtual offices? Then you need to be well-versed in virtual team communication tools and practices that will maintain productivity and efficiency.

Tips for Virtual Team Communication

When businesses allow for remote working, there’s always a certain level of nervousness attached to it. How will managers communicate with remote employees? How will different teams or offices communicate with each other? How do we track progress and productivity? Here are 10 proven tips to ease virtual team communication to ensure productivity.

1. Make Remote Working a Reality

In this day and age, a business that absolutely does not consider work-from-home as an option may run the risk of losing good employees. The most popular reason why business managers don’t want to consider remote working is because it’s hard to keep an eye on employees and maintain accountability. However, with the right work from home setup, you can establish and maintain communications while tracking the progress of remote teams.

When working remotely, many issues may pop up such as:

  • Lack of collaboration
  • Inability to contact employees
  • Urgent problem-solving needs, and so on

However, the right tools and platforms can help resolve these issues and create a more cohesive virtual office. Here are some of the tools available right now that can assist your team in virtual environments.

2. Invest in Reliable Technologies and Platforms

When working virtually and in different locations, what are the best ways to keep in touch and track your employees’ performance? The most popular answer: project management and cloud phone systems.

Project management systems can help track progress and milestones. On these platforms, teams can work together on projects and share them through the internet. As a manager, you can have access to your teams’ tasks and projects, and keep yourself up to date.

Get a business phone system that enables voice and video communication over the internet. Your entire team can make calls from their computers. This helps reduce costs and maintain connectivity. Communicate with employees as and when needed. Additionally, you can have calls routed to specific employees to ensure everyone is doing their job and no employee is sitting idle.

3. Choose the Right Virtual Team Communication Tools

Similar to the above point, depending on your business’ functions and needs, you will require appropriate virtual team communication tools. These include:

  • One platform for all communications (phone, email, chat, SMS, etc.)
  • Call forwarding and call transfer
  • Call recording software to record business calls
  • Audio and video conferencing
  • Project management systems
  • File storage and collaboration tools, and more

Find applications and software that work best for your teams. This may require some trial and error but getting the right tools can positively impact collaboration and productivity, even when working remotely.

4. Offer Different Mediums for Easy Communication

Don’t just stick to email or phone conversations for quick support. You may consider having a chat or SMS tool that can be accessed via their smartphone. You can also develop a system where employees who have queries or encounter issues may submit support tickets or “problem-forms” and receive the right solution via email. The trick is to offer different ways to stay connected.

5. Consider Time Zone Differences

Remote teams are not always located in the same city or country. And for this reason, all of your employees need to be aware of the different time zones involved. You may consider creating an online spreadsheet detailing contact and time zone information. This ensures no calls and meetings are conducted at inappropriate times. A time zone calculator may prove useful so users don’t have to spend time calculating the exact hour.

6. Create Guides, Knowledge Bases, and More

Another important aspect of virtual team communication is the ability to quickly access important or necessary information. One way to do so is by creating reliable communication channels (as mentioned above). However, another effective method is to create support guides and knowledge bases that can be accessed by relevant people. The point is to provide easy access to information so employees can do their jobs effectively. These guides can be stored on Dropbox, Google Drive, Microsoft’s OneDrive, or on your project management system’s storage feature.

7. Monitor Metrics and KPIs

Next, monitor important and relevant KPIs instead of constantly micromanaging and monitoring your employees. Focus on the results of their performance instead of how they are getting work done or how long they’ve been at their desk.

8. Make Goals and Proper Business Communication Behavior Clear

All your teams and employees need to be on the same page and know what the final goal is. The same goes for proper business communication. Define, explain, and practice. For instance, are emojis or GIFs allowed? How does voting take place? Does everyone need to respond or do only relevant people? How many times should employees check their messages or email, every 30 minutes or every hour? And so on.

9. Avoid Long and Unnecessary Video Calls

Video calls are necessary at times to get everybody on the same page to receive quick updates. However, it is easy to go off-track and end up on video calls for more time than needed. Therefore, plan to have video calls only when necessary and follow best practices. This will help in reducing the time spent on these calls and increasing productivity.

10. Check-in With Your Team Regularly

Finally, check in with your remote teams as often as possible but within reason. You may choose to do brief monthly meetings. However, it may help to check-in via email, a quick call, or chat every week to make remote employees feel valuable.

Need Help with Virtual Team Communication? Ask Us!

We offer tools that can help keep your business communication stay connected no matter where your employees or offices are located. Our virtual phone system can route calls as needed and it provides high-quality connection. To build your cloud phone system, call us at 1 (888) 908 6171 today!

What is Call Center Performance Management? [2026]

22nd July 2020 blog, Call Center

Sales and customer service reps and employees are often the first line of contact between your business and its customers. Therefore, their performance can directly impact how successful your business or call center is. Call center performance management is a surefire way to test and review employee performance and provide room for improvement.

What is Call Center Performance Management?

Call center performance management refers to the tracking, analyzing, calculating, and improving of agent and employee performance. Whether you run a virtual, remote, or on-premise call center, conducting performance management and reviews is important to determine how your agents are performing and how satisfied your customers are.

How to Manage and Improve Performance in Your Contact Center

Customers often reach out to a business to gain information about a product or service or to resolve an issue they are facing. And when they do so, they are almost always expecting a quick response, low wait times, friendly interaction, and a quick resolution. And so, your agents should be able to provide:

  • Personalized and friendly customer service
  • Improved first call resolution
  • Fast call resolution during the first call (in other words, high first call resolution rates)
  • Simple handling of the problem
  • Service for any additional issues

Call center performance management is tracking whether your agents and employees are able to do the above while upholding company standards. And then, training them appropriately, if they fail to meet your standards. The goal is to help your agents provide high levels of customer service and enhanced caller experience. Identifying where they are failing can help you as you help them succeed.

Measuring Call Center Performance Management

Call center performance management includes evaluating agent performance during customer interactions and how they line up with business goals. The best way to conduct performance management is to identify and use KPIs applicable to your business. Some KPIs to consider are:

  • Customer satisfaction scores (CSAT)
  • Average handle time
  • First call resolution
  • Average speed of answer
  • Average response time, and more

To measure the performance of your call center, first set realistic business goals. Then, use contact center software to learn about average handle time, wait times, conversions, first call resolution rates, customer satisfaction goals, and so on. By studying these metrics you can get a good idea of the strengths and weaknesses of your employees. As a manager, you can then make well-informed decisions about workforce management and ways to improve customer service.

Contact Center Performance Management Tools

1. Call Center Software
Your call center software can help with tracking important KPIs and metrics through call logs and activity reports. On-premise call center software is run by the company while a virtual call center software is hosted by a cloud server. The type of call center software you should choose depends on how much control you want to have over the software as well as your in-house IT team.

2. Contact Center Metrics and KPIs
As mentioned above, call center performance management includes tracking and measuring agent performance. Use relevant call center KPIs to study and optimize agent behavior before, during, and post calls.

3. Inbound/Outbound Call Recording
Use hosted call recording to listen in or review calls. These recordings can also help you train new employees by demonstrating acceptable and unacceptable agent behavior.

4. Coaching and Training
Use training material to continue training customer service employees on ways to reach and maintain company standards. Refresher courses, workshops, webinars, software tutorials, etc., can come in very handy.

Start Optimizing Agent Productivity!

Call center performance management will not only help you identify your team’s strengths and weaknesses but will also show you what steps need to be taken to optimize productivity and efficiency. This can help your call center offer better customer service and improve customer satisfaction. Start today!

11 Tips to Improve Your Outbound Calls Strategy

21st July 2020 blog, Call Management

Are your outbound calls not making enough sales? You may need to rethink your strategies and implement new ones. Here are 11 tips to improve your outbound calling strategy and generate more leads.

11 Proven Tips to Improve Your Outbound Calls Strategy

Outbound calls are outgoing calls made from a company to its customers, vendors, and business partners. During outbound calls, agents or representatives call a list of promising leads or prospects and encourage them to make a purchase or sign up for a service.

Some common reasons for outbound calling are:

  • To increase brand awareness and visibility
  • Proactive approaches such as checking in with customers, setting upcoming appointments, following up on recent purchases or abandoned carts, etc.
  • Offering customer success services where you and customers or clients together work towards a goal
  • Verify or activate accounts
  • Send out reminders for upcoming payments or renewals
  • Collect feedback or conduct market research, to name a few

Outbound calls are sometimes known as cold calls, which are frequently used for sales, telemarketing, customer success, and more. However, cold calling is difficult because most customers are not prepared for your pitch.

So what can you do to grab their attention more effectively? Here are 11 useful tips to improve your outbound calling strategy.

1. Set Realistic Goals: Identify KPIs

First, it is important to set reasonable goals and share these with your teams. These goals and milestones can be modified as your business grows and new factors come into play. Make sure everyone understands what the goals are and how to achieve them. For example, are outbound calls meant to survey prospects or make a sale? How many sales should be made per month or per quarter? And so on.

Additionally, you want to identify relevant key performance indicators (KPIs) so you can measure employee performance. Common KPIs associated with outbound and sales calls are:

  1. Average Handle Time: Length of calls in relation to the total number of calls. Longer handling times may indicate difficulty in closing, poor persuasion skills, or insufficient product knowledge.
  2. First Call Resolution: Number of calls resolved on the first call in relation to the total number of calls. High first call resolution indicates that agents are doing well and are able to sell effectively without wasting time.
  3. Conversion Rate: Number of sales in relation to the total number of calls. A low conversion rate means that not enough sales are being made and the outbound calling strategy needs more work.
  4. Occupancy Rate: Time agents are spending on calls in relation to the amount of unavailable time spent. A low rate for an agent or rep means that they are struggling with post-call work.

2. Create the Ideal Call List

This goes without saying but if you are not targeting the right audience and demographic for your business, you won’t make great sales. Therefore, creating the perfect list can impact how well your business performs. Conduct market research and allow collaboration between marketing and sales teams so that together they can work on ideal buyer personas for your product. Then, develop a promising list that agents can pursue and generate more sales with.

3. Get an Outbound Calling Service

Consider getting an outbound calling solution to support your local and international outbound calls. With a web dialer, your call center agent can quickly place calls from a computer and log important call notes.

Additionally, they can contact long-distance clients and display local area codes instead of international ones. Individuals are more likely to answer recognizable or local numbers instead of random, unknown ones.

4. Train Your Phone Sales Reps

Part of ensuring your phone sales reps are doing their jobs well is training them to do them correctly. Train and re-train agents to highlight and refresh best practices that they should imitate. Sit in on calls or record calls and review them to offer advice on proper and ineffective strategies. Refer to experts and webinars for more useful and modern sales development training tactics that outbound call center agents can use.

5. Collaborate with Marketing

Your marketing team has a good idea of how to sell to audiences. And your sales team knows who this audience is. Putting these two teams together can help you gain a bigger picture of your target audience and how to appeal to them.

6. Pay Attention to Your Prospect

Most agents dominate the call trying hard to make their pitch and sale. However, in order to gain their attention, you need to engage the prospect. Listen to them, pay attention to their needs, concerns, and issues. And adapt your pitch to make it flexible, allowing you to customize its relevance. This is much more useful as opposed to a stock script. Make them feel valued as individuals and not merely as another conquest in your sales job.

7. Study. Analyze. Optimize

Next, study your processes, responses, and agent performance. Use the KPIs and other metrics to track how your call center or business is performing. Analyze call tracking metrics to boost inside sales revenue.

8. Identify the Best Calling Times

Another factor worth paying attention to is the best time of day to call prospects. Most experts suggest that Wednesday and Thursday are the best days to call prospects. This is because they are not preoccupied with the upcoming week or getting ready for the weekend. Additionally, calling between 11 am and 1 pm or 4 pm and 5 pm is preferable instead of early morning or during the pre- or post-work commute.

9. Consider Outbound Calling Tools

As mentioned before, consider outbound calling tools such as a call center dialer, CRM, and customizable caller ID to boost your success rate. These tools make it easy and even automate processes to a certain degree which can make placing calls and closing deals faster.

10. Simplify the Process

Make it easy for prospects to understand your brand and product, find more information, and make the purchase. Only offer information that is necessary and relevant. Overstatement and technical jargon can put customers off.

11. Record and Review Interactions

It can be very helpful to see how your employees are interacting with customers. Use a call recording software to review calls and pay attention to customer preferences, behaviors, and more. This will give you insights into what aspects of your product or service are most and least successful. Based on that information, you can create better products and services and improve customer care.
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What is Customer Success?

16th July 2020 blog, Customer Service

If customer retention and churn are a problem for your business, then you need to up your customer success game. Here’s an in-depth guide to customer success and how to improve your strategy.

What is Customer Success?

Customer success refers to the process of providing proactive customer support and service. This includes anticipating potential challenges or issues faced by customers and reaching out to them beforehand to resolve those concerns.

With customer success, the chief customer officer can work closely with customers to improve customer satisfaction and boost relations. By doing so, your business can increase customer loyalty and retention. After all, who doesn’t want to work with a business that takes the time and effort to care for its customers?

Customer Success and Customer Support

To execute good customer success strategies, it is first important to understand the differences between customer support and success. Here is a table highlighting key points:

Customer Success Customer Support
1. Type of approach Proactive approach; reach out to customers before they reach out to you Reactive approach; provide support when a customer connects with you over an issue
2. Duration of interaction Long-term interactions; you work with the customer closely over a longer period of time Shorter interactions; you work with the customer to provide immediate solutions to a problem
3. Teams responsible Team collaboration between sales, marketing, support, product development, etc Operated solely by the customer support or service team
4. Metrics to measure Customer satisfaction, customer retention, customer health, customer lifetime value, etc Customer satisfaction, number of cases and tickets issued, first call resolution rates, hold time, average handle time, etc
5. Tasks to accomplish Improve customer experience, upsells, cross-sells, etc Technical support, knowledge base and guides, resolve tickets, etc.
6. Discover Areas of opportunity Problem areas
7. Ultimate goal To ensure a successful customer lifetime value To react and quickly solve issues

6 Proven Ways to Improve Your Customer Success Strategy

Any company that has customers and depends on customer satisfaction must invest in customer success managers. Being in the service industry, you will notice that it is harder and more expensive to acquire new customers. It is much cheaper and healthier, instead, to retain your current ones by taking care of them. These happy customers, in turn, will make good recommendations and advocate for your service.

1. Increase Brand Awareness
Work on brand visibility to make your brand a real thing for customers. An updated website and social media accounts, stats and valid data, attractive design, and user experience are a few ways to grab customer attention. Use your marketing team to improve the way customers and potential prospects see your brand and interact with it whether online (through social media, your website, web forms, product demos, content marketing) or offline (exhibitions, stores, advertising platforms).

2. Create Buyer Personas
Your marketing and sales team must collaborate to create ideal buyer personas for your product so your targeting efforts don’t go to waste. When developing buyer personas consider these questions:

  • Who are you trying to reach?
  • Factors or demographics are important to your persona: their budget, age range, income, location, purchasing power, etc.
  • What does your persona value?
  • Which problems are you trying to help your persona solve?
  • What content or information will catch your persona’s attention?

3. Provide Educational and Informative Content About Your Product
Use your website, emails, and social media accounts to provide your viewers with information:

  • About your product
  • How it is used
  • What issues or problems it can solve
  • How other businesses have used the product, etc.

The point is to demonstrate your expertise in the field and highlight your product or service’s successes. Maintain an updated website, highlight interviews, customer testimonials, blog posts, etc. Use common terms, avoid overwhelming technical jargon, and make knowledge bases or guides accessible. All of this will help solidify your business’ credibility, making customers trust it more. Educating customers makes your product or service more user-friendly, thereby improving the customer experience.

4. Provide Guided Onboarding
Spend extra time and energy on onboarding new customers. Guide them through the beginning of their journey with your service so they clearly understand how processes work and where they can find help. Once they are well-settled, make yourself available and reachable for initial issues that may turn up. Then, gradually move to automation and alerting so customers become more independent.

5. Offer Customer Support
Whether it is email, phone calls, live chat, or trouble tickets, your customer support team should be easy to contact. Additionally, you must equip your team with resources for quick resolution such as guides, etc. Make your business available 24/7 for customer support. You can do so by forwarding calls to other office locations or remote offices or using an IVR system to help with common issues and troubleshooting support.

6. Work to Improve Customer Loyalty
Customer loyalty means that for your customer, your business is “the one.” They will not look for another service or product to replace you. This is crucial to customer retention because a loyal customer will recommend your service to others and bring in more business.

Are You Ready to Build Successful Relationships With Your Customers?

Customer success is important as it can help your business build strong and meaningful customer relations. If your business needs to increase its customer retention rates, then it’s time to start offering more proactive global customer support today!

What is First Call Resolution?

15th July 2020 blog, Customer Service

Waiting hours and, sometimes, days to fix a problem that is central to one’s business or day-to-day life can be disheartening. And you do not want to disappoint your customers. Because . . .

Disappointed customers do not become recurring customers.

Disappointed customers do not feel loyalty to your brand.

Disappointed customers go to your competitor.

As a business, your primary goal should be creating good and useful products and assisting your customers in using those products and services. This also involves making it quick and easy for them to resolve issues related to product purchase and use. That’s where first call resolution (FCR) comes into play.

First call resolution directly impacts customer satisfaction and retention. It is being able to resolve customer concerns in one call or one contact. Therefore, your business or call center measure and track this KPI regularly. Here is a guide that will help you understand the importance of one call resolution and how to measure and improve FCR rates for your business.

What is First Call Resolution?

First call resolution means resolving customer questions or issues in the first call itself and an FCR rate measures a call center or business’ ability to resolve customer calls when they first call. In other words, customers who call to resolve a problem or inquire about a product are helped during the first call with no follow-up calls or emails are required. Resolving calls quickly like this does not mean reducing the quality of customer service. Instead, your teams work to resolve and close common customer issues within one call to make room for more complex issues while keeping customers satisfied with quick resolutions.

One call resolution or FCR is an essential call center KPI or metric. Most customer relationship management or CRM systems include this metric among others.

Another similar metric is the first contact resolution rate. This metric not only measures one call resolution but other support channels as well such as chat, tickets, and emails. By keeping an eye on these channels as well, you can aim to improve support across all support channels.

Why Should Your Contact Center Measure FCR?

When customers contact your company regarding an issue or product, they expect to have an answer quickly. The longer they have to wait to resolve a concern or question, the more likely they will find a different company that provides faster service and quicker solutions. Customer satisfaction (CSAT scores) drives brand loyalty and customer retention rates. Good first call resolution rates can improve customer satisfaction and help you keep your loyal and valued customers close.

Furthermore, this metric also helps you measure the efficiency of your employees or agents. For instance, how quickly can agents resolve a call? How much time is spent on resolving issues? Do they spend more time with follow-ups with the same customers or are they able to attend to others as well?

Calculating first call resolution can give you insights into how your business is performing in terms of customer satisfaction. The higher the FCR rates, the higher your customer satisfaction scores. For any contact center or business, the goal remains: achieving high first call resolution rates and low talk time.

Related: 7 Types of Customer Complaints & How to Resolve Them

How to Measure First Call Resolution?

FCR is commonly measured as the total number of calls resolved on the first call divided by the total number of calls received during a certain period of time.

When measuring first call resolution, you may want to consider the following criteria or factors that could affect this score:

  • What does “sufficiently resolved” mean? Is it only when a customer’s issue is resolved? Or does customer satisfaction count as well?
  • Does a callback include agents following up with callers via chat, SMS, or email?
  • Will FCR include calls handled by your IVR?
  • What about calls abandoned calls due to confusing IVR, long wait times, etc.?
  • Will a caller reaching the wrong department be included?
  • What about a call where a manager was conferenced in or that was transferred to a colleague?

Make sure you clearly define what FCR is and how it will be measured so that your agents and employees are prepared.

First Call Resolution
Source: DepositPhotos.com – Lic#153705050 ID#27446420

8 First Call Resolution Tips for Your Call Center

There are a few different ways to improve your contact center or business’ FCR rates:

1. Set realistic goals: Define what FCR is and ensure your agents and employees understand the importance of good FCR rates and show to achieve them.

2. Train agents: Train call center employees to meet your company’s standards and mission. Use a call recording service to highlight strengths and weaknesses.

3. Conduct performance analysis regularly: Review employee performance and efficiency by sitting in on calls or reviewing recordings.

4. Identify common customer questions and issues: The fastest way to help customers is to be prepared for issues or concerns that may arise while using your product or service. Identify common issues and train agents to quickly resolve.

5. Develop an easy-to-follow knowledge base or guide: Provide employees with a knowledge base or guide that can help them help customers efficiently.

6. Track FCR on all communication channels: If you communicate with clients via phone, email, live chat, social media, etc., ensure that you track FCR rates on all these channels. A low rate on other channels can bring your overall FCR rate down.

7. Develop incentive programs and rewards for employees: Give employees good reasons to do their job well so they work harder to resolve calls on the first try.

8. Set customer expectations: Create better caller experiences by reducing wait times, employing an effective IVR system, etc.

Your 3-Step Plan to Improve FCR

To improve one call resolution, you and your team first need to understand what type of issues do customers call to resolve and which issues take longer to resolve.  Once you identify issues that need 2-3 rounds of support to reach resolution, you can create plans that agents can use to reduce the resolution time. Here is a 3-step plan to improve first call resolution rates in your

1. Analyze Support Channels

Gather information from all support channels that needed more than one interaction to be resolved. Look at call records, chat history, email threads, and delayed tickets and analyze patterns and issues that occur repeatedly.

2. Prepare Action Plans and Resources

Once you’ve identified the main issues customers call to resolve, you can create resolution plans for those issues and patterns. This may include:

  • Sending the customer a how-to guide
  • Conferencing with a team or product expert
  • Letting the customer know the issue will take a few days to resolve and explaining why so that they understand
  • Adding new or temporary solutions and features to quickly resolve the issue
  • Finding new suppliers and vendors
  • Create a support center with documents and how-to guides for agents to use
  • Updating your product or service, and so on.

3. Train Your Support Team

Finally, train your agents to collect the right information during calls and provide the most appropriate solution. Encourage agents to collaborate with senior colleagues on complex cases through call conferencing tools and features. Provide agents with resources and materials to equip them with the solutions customers are looking for. You may even invest in software and tech that centralizes customer data and past interactions so that agents can review how other agents have handled similar issues and update records.

Improve First Call Resolution to Boost Customer Loyalty

Can call analytics help you gain better insights into FCR and how your business is doing to see where you can improve? Start measuring first call resolution today and secure your valued customers!

What is a Universal International Freephone Number (UIFN)?

13th July 2020 blog, Business Phone Numbers

Do you have customers in different parts of the world and are struggling to maintain unified communications? In this guide, we share everything there is to know about a UIFN or universal international freephone number.

What is a UIFN? Everything You Need to Know

A Universal International Freephone Number, also known as UIFN, is a unique type of international toll free number that can be dialed the same across 60 different countries. These numbers enable customers to receive a single freephone number for multiple countries. The UIFN program is administered by the International Telecommunication Union.

Get UIFN numbers

Benefits of Using a UIFN

There are many benefits to getting a universal toll free number. Here are the top 3 reasons why you should get a UIFN.

1. Global Coverage: UIFN is available in 60 different countries, so if your business conducts operations globally, then a universal toll free number can make your business accessible in multiple countries through a single number.

2. One Number: Companies with multiple office locations or branches can easily benefit from a UIFN. For example, an international company with several branches, a small business with remote offices, or a university with global campuses. With a universal toll free number, you have one number that connects your entire business across the globe.

3. Easy to Advertise: Plus, it is much easier to advertise for one number instead of multiple numbers for the different locations you are targeting.

Universal International Freephone Numbers - UIFN Explained

Universal Toll Free Number Restrictions

While there are many UIFN benefits, the technology does have some important restrictions to note. The most important restriction to note is the list of countries where UIFN is available. The second major UIFN restriction is mobile-accessibility. Finally, subscribers should consider that dialing conventions may vary across countries.

Mobile Accessibility

Universal toll free numbers are only mobile-accessible in a handful of countries. In certain countries, the number cannot be reached at all from a mobile phone. This is really important to note because roughly one-in-five people only have cell phone service. You should consult with your customers to find out what percentage of them use mobile phones.

Dialing Conventions

While dialing conventions are pretty standard across the United States, dial-out conventions vary across UIFN countries. For example, certain countries require callers to dial 00 before the number, while other countries require 01. It can be difficult to communicate this information to customers.

In order to avoid irregular dialing conventions, we recommend that businesses properly communicate this information to their customers. This helps avoid any common problems associated with UIFN.

UIFN Country List

While it seems appealing to have a single number that works everywhere in the world, the reality is that not every country is involved in the ITU program. Here is a list of UIFN countries:

Argentina Australia Austria Belgium
Brazil Bulgaria Canada China
Colombia Costa Rica Croatia Cyprus
Czech Republic Denmark Estonia Finland
France French Guiana Germany Greece
Guadeloupe Hong Kong Hungary Iceland
Israel Italy Japan Korea South
Latvia Lithuania Luxembourg Macao
Macedonia Malaysia Malta Martinique
Mayotte Moldova Monaco Netherlands
New Zealand Norway Peru Philippines
Poland Portugal Reunion Romania
Saint Pierre & Miquelon Singapore Slovakia Slovenia
South Africa Spain Sweden Switzerland
Taiwan Thailand United Kingdom Uruguay

For more wide global coverage and lower setup fees, you may consider our Toll Free FlexDial solution instead. Chat with our reps to learn more about this global toll-free number service or view FlexDial rates.

How to Dial a UIFN Number?

Now that you have a better understanding of how UIFN numbers work, let’s look at how to dial a UIFN number. A UIFN is formatted as a fixed 11-digit phone number. It starts with a 3-digit code to enable toll-free service, such as 800, assigned to them by the ITU. This is followed by an 8-digit global subscriber number (GSN). For example, +800 00123456, where 800 is the country code and 00123456 is the GSN. However, dial-out prefixes may need to be entered before dialing the UIFN to connect to the right business.

Customers from anywhere in the world can dial and call a UIFN number without being charged for the call. However, the format varies depending on which country is being called. The format generally is:

International access code (IAC) + 800 + 8-digit UIFN

And so, to successfully dial a UIFN number, customers need to know the appropriate international phone prefix. Then, they can add 800 and dial the rest of your UIFN number. Always confirm with your provider what your customers will need to dial to reach you.

As you can see, the process to dial a universal toll free number can be slightly complicated. Additionally, when dialing, customers may not recognize this number as a toll free number. They are typically more accustomed to 800 numbers or their national toll free number formats.

Sign Up For UIFN

UIFN or ITFS

You’ve probably already asked yourself which would be better for your company, UIFN or ITFS. While the concept of UIFN is great in principle, there are some drawbacks to be aware of.

  • UIFN coverage is limited and certain countries do not have mobile access.
  • In the countries where UIFN is available, callers must be aware of unique dialing conventions.
  • There is a high cost and lengthy setup time.

We have many customers that prefer ITFS numbers instead of UIFN because of the wider global coverage available through ITFS. In addition, ITFS numbers generally have much fewer restrictions and can be set up rather quickly. It should be determined on a case-by-case basis which option is better for your business.

Universal Coverage with UIFN Numbers

If you want to expand your business globally and work with customers from different countries, then getting a UIFN number is a good place to start. You could also purchase multiple local access numbers for a cheaper rate. Customers are more likely to dial local numbers instead of numbers they don’t recognize. For more information call 1 (561) 908-6171.

How to Set up a Virtual Phone System?

9th July 2020 blog, Cloud Telephony

Need to upgrade your business phone system? Thanks to advancements in telecommunications, a virtual phone system can help you organize and manage calls while expanding your reach. Follow these steps and set up your business communications quickly!

What is a Virtual Phone System?

In short, a virtual phone system is just like a traditional phone system, except that it works virtually. With such a system, you can run communications from any location or device. You are not limited to your immediate physical location. Additionally, since communications are virtual, you can connect with long-distance clientele more quickly and with lower calling charges.

A virtual or hosted phone system is made up of:

  • Virtual phone numbers such as toll free, local, and international numbers.
  • VoIP or PBX set-up.
  • Features such as call forwarding, call routing, IVR systems, extensions, call recording, and more.
  • Online account management.

With a virtual or cloud phone system, you can keep communications running no matter where you are located. Plus, it facilitates easy communication between remote offices and employees. To get a virtual phone system, you need to sign up with a virtual phone service provider. Here are key steps to keep in mind.

1. Determine Your Needs

Before getting a virtual phone system for business communications, you first need to determine what you need from your virtual phone system. What type of connections do you want to maintain: just local or international as well? Do you need multiple toll free and international numbers?

Consider the various features virtual phone service providers offer. What features would you like your communication system to have? Do you need to record calls or a dynamic caller ID to display custom caller IDs?

Finally, what is your budget and how high are you willing to go? There are countless providers out there but you need one that can accommodate all your requirements and still fit your budget.

2. Research Virtual Phone Service Providers

Once you have a good idea of what you want from your business virtual phone system, start researching the market. Review various virtual phone service providers, how long they’ve been in the market, their pricing and list of features, customer reviews, etc.

Global Call Forwarding has been in the business since 2007 and continues the legacy of its parent company, United World Telecom, established in 1996. Global Call Forwarding has been offering toll free, local, and international numbers to businesses through number hosting in more than 160 countries across the world. We also offer common and premium communication features such as call forwarding, IVR and extensions, call recording, outbound calling, and more. You can choose a plan suitable for your size and needs from our 5 plans.

3. Sign Up for the Service

Now, sign up for the provider that gives you everything you need at a price you desire. You can sign up for our service through our website or by calling 1 (877) 898 8646. Activate your service and start advertising your new number!

4. Set Up Call Forwarding

The main component of a virtual phone system is forwarding incoming calls to devices or lines of your choice. This is especially beneficial when receiving international or long-distance calls. To better explain, when you purchase an international or toll free number for a different country, residents of that country can call this number for local charges or for free. However, that call is routed through a call forwarding service to your office line, field office, or home office, as desired.

Therefore, if you purchase multiple numbers for different cities, states, and countries, then the first step is to map out how calls will be forwarded and where to. Route calls based on the location of the incoming call or the time the call is being made.

5. Set Up Features

Next, set up and organize the features you purchased. For example, create your custom greetings and voicemail messages. Map out and design your IVR system. If you have an outbound calling service, you may want to download the web dialer or outbound dialer that comes with your service and update it with current contacts and records. This way, you can start placing calls quickly.

6. Start Placing and Receiving Calls!

Now that everything is set up and ready to use, start making calls to local and international clients and prospects. And be prepared to offer excellent customer service to customers located in your target areas.

Get Your Virtual Phone System with Global Call Forwarding

Want to learn more about how we can help you build an ideal virtual business phone system? Reach out to one of our experts today and find customized solutions for your business!